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Nick Culverwell, president of the Garden District Residents Association, hopes a redevelopment plan for Seaton House on George Street will focus on providing housing for at-risk seniors. (Gemma Karstens-Smith / Toronto Star)

Built in 1856, 295 George Street was the first international Fegan Boys Home. It currently stands derelict and abandoned after a 2011 fire. (Gemma Karstens-Smith / Toronto Star)

In July, the city green lit plans to revive the homes as part of a redevelopment of the neighbouring men’s shelter. But some neighbours question if the plans will fix the area’s problems.

In the 1800s, what is now a stretch of George St. between Gerrard and Dundas was part of politician George William Allan’s expansive family property. Today it is an area plagued by violence and substance abuse.

Neighbours often point to the density of Seaton House as the epicentre of the issues. The warehouselike structure at 339 George St. provides shelter to more than 500 homeless men.

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“It’s a fantastic location, but it absolutely has its challenges,” Nick Culverwell, president of the Garden District Residents Association, said of his neighbourhood.

Culverwell has lived in the area for a decade, and has witnessed the issues on George firsthand, from squatters in the sagging old houses to drug dealers hanging around the shelter on days that residents get their social assistance cheques.

“It just seems like a horrible environment to put these people in,” he said. “I mean, why would you pack them in with hundreds of people who all share the same issue, surrounded by a bunch of guys who all want to sell them drugs? It just doesn’t seem like a very effective way of treating the actual problem.”

The area has a history of providing shelter for those in need.

The now-skeletal structure at 295 George St. became the first international Fegan Boys’ Home in 1886. Orphaned and impoverished boys would come over from the England and Ireland and stay there before being shipped west for work.

When the boys’ home closed in 1937, the property was sold to “The Society for Crippled Civilians,” which later became Goodwill. Goodwill’s first clothing store was at 295 George.

Next door, where plants now climb the walls the Georgian-style home at 297 George St., the Salvation Army operated a “rest home.” The gable-roofed building acted as a shelter from 1886 until 1948.

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The area was also sought-after by wealthy residents who wanted to live in the finest houses of the day.

Down the street lived Thomas Meredith, a grain merchant who worked with Gooderham and Worts Distillery, one of Toronto's first manufacturing empires. The Italianate-style building with its extended eaves was in Meredith’s family from 1858 until 1911.

In recent years, the homes along George Street have fallen into disrepair. Fire ravaged 295 George St. in October 2011, gutting what was left of the home’s interior. The scorch marks have been cleaned from the brown brick exterior, but the missing windows and overgrown yard mask the beauty of the Georgian and Victorian architecture. A year later, 301 George St. went up in a four-alarm blaze. The home that was once a shining example of Edwardian Classicism is now just bricks and boards.

Seven of the eight homes along the stretch of George Street between Gerrard and Dundas have been designated as heritage properties under the Ontario Heritage Act. The move was meant to give the city authority to enforce heritage property standards and maintenance, and refuse demolition. But the houses are all now in various states of disrepair.

In July, the city approved plans to redevelop Seaton House, including buying the eight derelict homes, because more real estate is needed to carry out the plans.

“If the properties are not purchased at this time, secured and stabilized, the risk of losing them altogether through demolition by neglect is significant,” a report to city council read.

Negotiations over the properties are still ongoing, and details won’t be made public until they’re complete, Patricia Anderson, a manager with the city’s Shelter, Support & Housing Administration Division, said in an email.

Preserving the houses’ history through the redevelopment is crucial, said Kristyn Wong-Tam, councillor for the area.

“We will do everything we can to preserve the heritage.”

Turning the derelict buildings into usable spaces will be more expensive than tearing them down, but the preservation will set a precedent for developers, Wong-Tam said.

“I believe it is extremely important that the city leads the way in heritage restoration, so when developers come to us and say that they can’t do it, I want to be able to demonstrate to them why you can do it. Because the city is going to do it here.”

Neighbours such as Culverwell want to see the homes’ history preserved, but they also want to see the city address the social problems in the area.

“If the use of the eight houses is to essentially replicate the existing Seaton House model, we would be very strongly against that. We view that as a failed model,” Culverwell said.

“We just hope that it’s less dense than it is now, that it provides a safer and more helpful environment for the people who live there.”

The report approved by city council recommended that redevelopment include an emergency shelter with about 100 beds, a long-term care home with about 162 beds, community space where clients can access services, and possibly private development. A final proposal will be presented to council in 2015, and work won’t begin until at least 2017.

The plan is a “unique opportunity” to put many different services and community organizations in one place to meet the needs of homeless men, said Anderson.

For Wong-Tam, the redevelopment is an opportunity to revitalize a neighbourhood that hasn’t had a lot of good news in the past.

“I think that someone has to stand up and do the best that they can to make sure this neighbourhood deserves the attention it deserves, and that we don’t revitalize the neighbourhood without caring for who’s already there.”

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